Coffee and electronic pop-punk?

I spent the last two nights working on my sculpture project until 4 in the morning. I'll get some photos and put them up on here sometime. Let me tell you, procrastination does not make one feel good. Especially one who lives on a gramp0meter. Let me describe to you what the grampometer is. It is when your body shuts down around 11:00pm, or in the first 15 minutes of a movie, regardless of your intent. Needless to say I used some tactics like loud dance music and coffee (something I have been drinking a lot here at Pockleton) to get through the long nights. Overall, I think it was a great success.

Anyway, I just wanted to write about this band called Hellogoodbye. I know what you're thinking, it's pop-punk with keyboards and it is awful. Well, that is what I thought it was when I first heard them. Now if you know me or know me well enough to get to talking to me about pop-punk music you know that it stands for everything that I hate. The thing is, I heard them while I was getting a ride to Wal-Mart the other day and I heard a song with vocoded vocals and dance beats and I asked who I was riding with what it was. They said it was Hellogoodbye. I said "No way, when did they get good?" It turns out that they disguise that generic pop punk voice with a vocoder, sing about love, and bust out the dance beats; they are Daft Punk for the emo kids.

Granted not all of their songs are like that, and some really grate on me, but man I was so surprised when they had one or two good songs.

Here (In Your Arms) - Hellogoodbye (Youtube)

NIN w/ Peter Murphy & New Faint Song

Ok, today I really shouldn't be writing on this, I'll make a pact to get out of here at 9, and back into the lab to work.

Anyway, I was procrastinating as usual and found a great post at sonoroma.net. Apparently on tour right now, NIN collaborated with the great Peter Murphy of Bauhaus, and did some songs from NIN and some from Bauhaus. It's some great stuff.

Warm Leatherette (Bauhaus)

A Strange Kind of Love (Bauhaus)

Reptile (NIN)

Dreams w/TV on the Radio !!!

So that's really cool. I am excited.

To top it off, apparently the faint played 4 new songs in San Francisco. They were "The Geeks were Right", "Metal Hawks", "Fish in the Womb", and "Seduced". I read all this at More than Milk, where they had a link to live version of the "The Geeks were Right."

More guitar oriented this time around, I am excited to hear new stuff from them!

2007 is a great year for music.

AGH! Back to work!

Add: Get Seduced - The Faint

Bloc Party and Working Backwards

I really should be working on a project right now, but instead, I am on here writing again. 3 posts for 3 days. This is either healthy expression combined with professional enthusiasm or an addiction. I'm not ready to say what I think it is yet.

So the new Bloc Party album came out a little while ago. Honestly, I never liked Bloc Party that much, I remember arguing with people that their sound was a little all over the place (skittery, jumbled, mismatched) and that other bands that had been released around the same time (The Bravery) were a more focused and in and of themselves a complete package. That's right, I like the Bravery more than Bloc Party. Mostly because of their sweet sweet keyboards, and that their front man really can't sing and is always drunk. Anyway, back to Bloc Party, I do like "Banquet", and I think one or two songs on the new disc might be enjoyable too.

Artist: Bloc Party

Title: A Weekend in the City

Kele Oleorke’s vocals sound like a timid king riding atop a crashing wave of instrumentation. That being said, the instrumentation is more lush and rich when compared to their first album but the quiet moderate tempo to brash jittery middle and crashing end formula is rarely abandoned at all throughout the entire CD. The outstanding singles are “The Prayer” (4) and “I Still Remember” (9), the former being a more tribal track that reminds me of TV on the Radio a little, and the latter, while being the best track on the album, has a few of the same notes from Wham’s “Last Christmas”, it jars me out of the song, but overall it’s a lighter more agile song that is a pleasant listen.

Video for "I Still Remember"

Buy "A Weekend in the City" by Bloc Party

Andrew Bird and Procrastination

So, I got up this morning and didn't know what to do, or where I'd get the motivation to do it. So, what do I do? I sit at my computer. This is the default action that I perform when there is no alternate stimulus to draw me into something else. Anyway, where do I go on my computer? The music player and the internet. Then, listening to the new CD's I have to review, I realized that writing up reviews would be a productive and acceptable endeavor. So without further stalling, here's my first review for next week.

Artist: Andrew Bird

Title: Armchair Apocrypha

A consistently mellow mélange of violin, whistling, and minimal guitar. Unlike his previous album “Mysterious Production of Eggs”, there’s no magical singles that roar into existence with ethnic/indie flair (Skin is My, Fake Palindromes), there’s also no 2 to 3 songs in one song rambling either. “Heretics” (4) makes slight allusions to “Fake Palindromes” using its violin bits. The witty lyrics this time around involve being grateful that “It’s Fatal”, thank god. The chill break beats and wafting violin of “Simple X” (7) made it my favorite track on the album. “Scythian Empire” has a gentle multi-folk-instrumental-build that bounces like a bike ride through a small European town. This time around Andrew Bird doesn’t knock your socks off, he carefully pulls them off. Either way, you're still barefoot.

Simple X Live at Bonnaroo
Buy Armchair Apocrypha by Andrew Bird

Getting Paid

Life

Sit up straight, do your homework, get to the gym, be prepared, get to work early, make a good impression, don't be distracted by coincidental things, succeed.

So I have a job reviewing CD's for the radio station, and I write flowery descriptions of what the album sounds like to me. If you'd care to read them, I'll post them.

Any takers?

Well, since I'll assume no one will read this, I'm going to go ahead and do it anyway.

Artist: LCD Soundsystem

Title: North American Scum

The AC-DC chorused backing vocals, muted bass/guitar crunches, smooth keyboards, and my favorite touch, Nancy Wang (Keyboards) shouts along with James Murphy sometimes when he yells "North America" are to my liking. LCD has improved and I approve.

See the Video
Buy North American Scum

Artist: Arcade Fire

Title: Neon Bible

This is a moody album built on the concept of restriction and freedom. The standout mid-tempo song of the album is “Intervention” (4) which is lead by a powerful pipe organ and some poignant lyrics about the church and how it sucks people in. When faster songs like “Keep the Car Running” (7) and “The Well and the Lighthouse” (10) kick in, you feel the propulsion and the joy the band puts into their work. It is only amplified by being framed by some of the plodding morose slower tracks. The only track that combines a shuffling slow beat and the tremendous power of the Arcade Fire is “My Body is a Cage” (11), which sounds like the one song people would look forward to on Sunday.

Live video for "Keep the Car Running"
Buy Neon Bible

Artist: !!! (Chk Chk Chk)
Title: Myth Takes

If I ever had to choose one album to score an awesome heist/gang/buddy/action movie this would be the album for it. The music creates an atmosphere that calls to mind running through back alleys, car chases and of course dirty dance floors (in the best way possible). !!! have mastered their sound and absorbed members of the defunct Out Hud to assist (finally) with putting electronic touches on their songs. “Heart of Hearts” (5) features one such buzzing electro beat. “Yadnus” breaks down !!!’s sound to it core essentials and stomps forward with notable agility. “Must be the Moon” (3) toys with some raps and vocal distortion over the electronically enhanced clap beat to great effect and “Bend Over Beethoven” (9) uses the elements of the build from their previous album and becomes quite powerful towards the end. Another notable track is the final one, “Infinifold”, (10) is a track completely devoid of beats and full of piano and falsetto. It is surprisingly beautiful. This is !!!’s strongest work to date.

See the Video for "Heart of Hearts"
Buy Myth Takes
!!! Myspace